This collection captures Days 13 through 19 of the 100 poems in 100 days creative challenge I am participating in. These entries were written daily. They were just shared as a batch in one post. The first 12 were shared daily as solo posts. These poems reflect a week of observation, reflection, and response. Each poem is a moment in time. You’ll find poetry that is personal, political, and more. I am documenting memory, grief, injustice, and the search for clarity and home.
While these seven poems are shared together, the writing continued daily,as it will continue until day 100. Future entries (Days 20–100) will be posted either individually or in small batches, like the first 19. This will keep readers present and on their toes as to when new daily poems are coming. The ongoing rhythm mirrors life itself: unpredictable, urgent, and evolving.
Each poem is paired with a Poet’s Note to deepen the context. It reflects on its inspiration. It draws connections between the personal and societal, and the intimate and the global.
Day 13 – 1/2/2026
“Rhyme”
Ukraine
Palestine
Venezuela
There is no point in trying to
Rhyme
Nigeria
Iran
Sudan
Their lives the cost at the end of the billionaires
Riches
Oil, minerals
Human greed
The West strikes again to save the Middle East
American propaganda machine
Poet’s Note
In the shadow of global conflict and the Christmas night bombing in Nigeria. This poem names the human cost behind headlines. Revealing the repeated cycles of violence. Then highlighting the ways ordinary people bear the burden of power, greed, and war. This is poetry that challenges the systems that profit from oppression. Naming places directly like Venezuela, Iran, and Sudan. I want to mention this poem is about all the places affected by these systems, and the people impacted. It is a call to witness what is often ignored.
Day 14 – 1/3/2026
“Warm Places, Cold World”
I am blessed to have
many warm places in a world so cold.
My home
My car
The woods
places I feel safe
Yet when the lonely days are too rough
My partner’s arms
My mother-in-law’s couch
Or friends with shared spaces
Are places I am blessed to know
On this winding road, finding pieces of home
West Virginia roads once led me there
now the memories of
the place are
scattered
everywhere
Curating a place for me
after searching eternally
Poet’s Note
Written 1/3/2026, this poem reflects on the fragments of home we find throughout life. Safety, warmth, and belonging can appear in unexpected places, from people to landscapes to fleeting moments. Home is not just geography; it is collected through memory, connection, and care.
Day 15 – 1/4/2026
“The Same”
Swipe.F
l
i
c
k. M o .
v e
The days on the calendar
float on by,
though they
always stay
the same.
R l
o l.
T
u
r
n.
Change….
The numbers on the clock,
never showing
a repeating
moment….
Though, they always
stay
the
same.
Fast-forward
or reverse,
wherever
you
choose
to
press
play.
World history
or
familial ties
through bloodlines,
cursed or blessed,
they never look
the same.
Though,
they always stay
the
same.
Who is to blame for never making the change?
Those in history?
Or
Those of us living through its
repeats?
Poets note
This poem traces the rhythm of repetition, the illusion of movement in days, clocks, and history. Swipe, flick, turn… As we do on our phones. Then we press play, like a movie, thinking we are deciding, thinking we are moving. Yet so much is actually left unchanged. The poem artistically depicts the movements we make on our phones. As well as showing how we rewound, fast forwarded, and pressed play on VHS tapes, DVDs, and more. Using both depictions to show time and how things change yet stay the same.
The lines stretch, scatter, and move on the page like our attempts to grasp time and meaning. Showing how moments pass, events unfold, generations bear patterns… Yet in their echo, the sameness persists. Asking quietly and plainly: when cycles repeat, who holds the responsibility? Those who lived before? Or those of us who carry the weight now?
This piece is both a mirror and a map. Acting as a reflection on history’s repetitions and the intimate, daily rhythms we navigate. It acknowledges the frustration of watching patterns endure while searching for change. Poetically playing on tension between inevitability and agency.
Pause here with me for a moment.
Did any line, feeling, or piece here stick out or to you more?
I’d love to hear the details regarding which and the ways it resonated.
Think about it and tell me in the comments?
or
At the end of this post you could comment a line, quote, or your full poem. Poems from the past, that align with these daily themes are welcome, as well as those written this week.
Any and all interactions or additional conversation pieces and starters highly appreciated. We enjoy reading your creative pieces, input, takes, reviews,reflections, and all the interactions in between.
Day 16 – 1/5/2026
A micro-poem on Grief
“Goodbye, Breathe”
I wish you had
thought to
breathe your quiet
warmth inside of me
one last time
before you said
goodbye
Poet’s Note
Today’s micro-poem captures grief and the longing for a final shared moment. Its brevity emphasizes the weight of absence, memory, and the lingering warmth of those we lose. Even in few lines, poetry can cradle the unspeakable and hold the echo of those gone. This was written in the shadow of grief after the loss of my mother. “Goodbye, Breathe” works at showing how some poetry is adaptable to any type of loss. Here I leave the meaning up to interpretation by the reader yet fully convey my feelings.
Day 17 – 1/6/2026
“Circus and Cake”
Downplayed self‑care in society
Overworked, under‑lived lives….
Romanticized
You work a hundred hours a week…
Just to spend all your time off
feeling
weak.
You barely scrape by.
Yet you have the mind to brag
and boast.
Making the hours you waste
working
a competition to make yourself feel
better…
No matter how much you try to…
disguise it
it’s true
They made the working-class
slaves
Then we thanked them for it.
They took away the circus and
the
cake.
And
instead of throwing a fit…
we blamed each
other for it
Poet’s Note
“Circus and Cake” a poem reflecting on distraction through comfort. Small pleasures and fleeting indulgences that can pacify people while systemic exploitation continues. The stolen “circus” and “cake” are symbols of joy and entertainment. Throughout history, government agencies have used bread and circuses to distract their citizens. Panem et circuses was the Latin term used to represent this. The poem highlights governmental distractions and questions readers in different ways.
What has changed in our society?
We had our stability (bread, cake, food, etc) and
entertainment (circus, distractions that are fun, etc)
all but fully removed.
Yet we remain distracted.
Why?
Day 18 – 1/7/2026
Prelude: Axton curated the piece below while sitting at Mount Wood Overlook in Wheeling, West Virginia. Also called the Castle Overlook or just the Overlook. At present time tourists and locals alike use this overlook for an array of things. Most visitors come for sightseeing, unique photography, and outdoor hangouts. Others are drawn to public murals created by the local Wheeling Art Commission. Urban-exploration also tops the list of reasons you’d find an individual visiting the overlook.
But, for creative and emotionally driven humans, this paces exists to reminisce. Grief, childhood memories, or even a longing for home. Add to that the need to unpack big things in equally big spaces, that call us places like this. Last and maybe most important a giant serving of nostalgia. And now you can truly see why the overlook fits for these needs, as well as some mischievous happenings too.
“Cremated”
And
every time I come home,
it’s a little
lonelier
than the last.
And
every time I come home,
I wonder if
somehow
home
has
picked up
and
left.
Or did I?
Was the place I knew
turned to crumbled remains with you?
Cremate my home
right
along
with
you?
Ashes
to
Ashes,
Dust
to
Dust,
I still
just
collect
the
pieces
along the
way.
My torture evergreen.
Poet’s Note
Written at Mount Wood Overlook in Wheeling, WV. A poem that explores home, memory, and loss. Sharing Feelings of grief and loss I feel when returning to the place I grew up since the death of my mother. The loss of feeling at home since she was cremated, “Cremated” poetically describes the cremation of home. The overlook, was built in the 1920’s. It was originally supposed to house a doctor before life drama got in the way of completing it. The structure now watches over absent families and scattered histories. The overlook castle (as locals call it) also showcases wicked graffiti, which doesn’t stay the same long. Here home is collected in fragments, in memories, and in what remains. For some reason, even when it feels lonelier each time I return.
Day 19 – 1/8/2026
“Vigilante Justice”
Let’s start a fire inside the United States,
figuratively,
of course.
We can start by using
oppression,
hatred,
and bigotry
as gasoline to fuel
this movement.
Melting down
ice
into
nonexistence.
Covering the country’s soil in fluids
other than
spilled blood
from darker
complexions,
the first time in a whole fucking year….
The
presidency ….
has three
entire
years
to go,
still
….
Scariest thing,
if you ask me,
the collective inability to remember
how things were before…
When they were just a
minute fraction
of the pie
closer to equality
We do not want…
Venezuelan oil.
We do not want to
overthrow……
Greenland.
Mexico.
Canada.
We want
education,
affordable
healthcare,
workers’
rights,
equality
for
all
Now
OR
vengeance for each
and every infraction.
Come tomorrow and on.
A
vigilante
is
what
we
need….
And a
vigilante
I
may
soon
be.
Poet’s Note
A piece that uses fire as metaphor, representing accountability and resistance rather than destruction. It critiques complacency, systemic injustice, and the erasure of memory. Then it names the need for moral vigilance and collective action. This is poetry that refuses to stay passive in the face of oppression.
These seven days trace a path through personal and global reflection, grief, memory, and resistance. They examine cycles of oppression, moments of warmth and home. The tension between complacency and action lives in these poems. From international injustice to intimate loss. Stolen joy and moral awakening find their homes here. Poems as witness, critique, and call-to-action. Each a fragment of a daily personal creative contest. Join me in observing the world and responding with honesty, urgency, and reflection.
Please feel free to share this post with anyone you think would benefit from reading these poems in any form.
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Share this with them and challenge them to create one poem or piece of art every day for 100 days.
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